3.5 stars. This book has some genuinely funny moment. Real life stories about getting cast due to a blue raincoat, Oscar red carpet mishaps, and peeing next to celebrities? Judy Greer seems like a fun, relatively normal Midwestern girl who just happens to be an actress and know some famous people. She seems super, well, normal. Fun read.

An inspiring story, written like journal entries or short stories ala Chicken Soup for the Soul. I give it four stars not for the writing style, but for the questions the book raised about whether people can truly be rehabilitated or even redeemed. Highly recommend watching Laura Bates' TEDx talk called "Shakespeare in Shackles."

I have read several of Philip Yancey's books, and unlike many authors that frequent my bookshelf, I have enjoyed every Yancey book that I've read. I read Soul Survivor as my last Sabbath book, and so I wanted to read his thoughts on a tough subject that continues to confuse me. It seems Yancey is as confused by prayer as I am. There are no easy answers or step-by-step processes. A few things that made a difference for me included thinking about Old Testament versus New Testament prayers and how prayer has changed within the last few hundred years to become much more personal than it used to be. Yancey had a few things to say about "praying without ceasing." I have an image of a woman, picturing those that she cares about in her mind and saying, "Lord have mercy" for each one. God knows what mercies they need.

These are just a few things from his book. There are many more questions that he attempts to answer and vignettes from others. As with many Yancey books, it was a personal quest that started him down the path to write this book. It was a discovery process, one I found extremely helpful and thought-provoking.

Another Sabbath read. Lauren Winner is a totally different personality than myself. She's emotional and raw and passionate, which both annoyed me (at times) but also fascinated me too, much like she probably would in real life. Some parts of the book were written so beautifully and expressed my own feelings. Other parts were very different. It exposed me to a viewpoint other than my own, which is what makes this book valuable.